Dust, Debris and Ditches
Kielder Forest Stages is known as a fast and loose event with the lethal deep ditches either side renowned for claiming cars. Our day started bright and early heading out to stage one which included getting some of our own gravel kilometers in up the fire-road before a short hike.
It’s always amazing to see how many people trek to the middle of nowhere in a forest in the north of England to watch national rallying. Okay it’s not the thousands who turn up to watch the Formula One at Silverstone but it’s a step in the right direction for national motorsport.
The spot we found gave us an unreal view up to a fast left hander before the teams come down the hill towards us. At the bottom of the hill was a long right straight into a sharp left before they hammer it up the hill beside us. The sprint up the hill featured a drop off either side of the stage primed for catching drivers out.
The running order was a bit funky, starting off with the historics and up to 1400cc cars followed by everyone else with the fastest cars going first. Oh and the Bowler Defenders went right at the back (probably for the best). Going in that order meant the two wheel drive cars in 1600cc and 2000cc were at the mercy of a stage that had been shredded by the monstrous four wheel drive cars which had come before.
Seeing the first cars coming screaming through the gravel, the dust cloud tail following behind is a sight that never gets old. The roar of Millington powered MKII escorts was first up with a suitable level of sliding round the corners and fishtailing as they throttled up on the straights.
There was a noticeable step change in pace as the first R5 came through, antilag doing it’s best impression of rice-crispies as the four wheeled furry fired gravel everywhere.
There were a few near misses with the ditches, a number of cars dropping wheels with the four wheel drive cars managing to pull themselves out.
The last cars to come through were the Bowler Challenge Defenders, it was terrifying to see these pretty much bog standard JLR products coming wallowing through the stage.
After the Bowlers had been through it was time for us to trek back to the car and make the journey to Stage 5, grabbing some lunch on the way of course. What we’d not anticipated with the spectator area at Stage 5 was the nearly four miles of driving up a gravel forest road. Once we’d parked/abandoned the car at the side we began to hike through the woods to find a safe but secluded spot to spectate from further away from the public viewing area.
It wasn’t until the four wheel drive cars were heading through that we realised quite how far some of the gravel and debris is flung by the acceleration. A fist sized rock came bouncing through the tree line and came to a rest barely five feet from us. Luckily with a zoom lens standing a bit further back behind more trees meant we could still get some shots.
Check out more snaps from the Kielder Stages below.
Tucked away in the woods we had an epic view with cars swinging round a 90 right before piling the power on along a straight into a fast right, left right. Snapping cars through the trees gave it a moody and dramatic vibe but getting the timing right was a challenge to say the least.
Images and words by Mitcham Media
